Orange Mantra

Like most of the country Essex is snugly encased in a duvet of deep snow this morning.  Fortunately, this avalanche did not hit us until Saturday night otherwise our return journey from Suffolk may have taken several days rather than an hour!  However, that may not have been a bad thing especially as we were lucky enough to stay at Seckford Hall for a recent wedding.  You can't see Seckford Hall from the A12 as it is tucked in a hollow. I for one have passed this hotel on my way to Southwold for many years without a second thought. According to historians this Tudor building started to take shape in the 1530's but it may be even older than this. The parkland setting and building are immaculate and come with some low ceilings and flooring that wouldn't be out of place on a roller coaster!  The rooms are well equipped with all the modern conveniences that Henry V111 would not have enjoyed when he stayed over. However, more recent historic figures such as Margaret Thatcher and David Cameron (when he was just an MP) have stayed in these historic chambers.  We only had chance to stay for breakfast but it was excellent. For the healthy eaters there was an excellent cold buffet offering a gargantuan choice of dishes and if that was not your cup of tea there was a cooked breakfast for the more traditional. Overall excellent food and service from the team. I might not get to Southwold next time!  Ok, let's talk about chocolate.....

The Chocolate:  Orange Mantra, my last bar from Chocolate and Love. With Fairtrade Fortnight just on the horizon it is worth mentioning that Chocolate and Love have very green credentials.  Whilst they may not make their own bars they have spent a lot of time and effort to ensure their chocolate is ethically pleasing. They use 100% organic ingredients, there cocoa is sourced from small farms in Peru and The Dominican Republic, sugar is from Paraguay and vanilla is from Madagascar. Importantly there is no child labour. If any of these were not enough to make you want to buy their chocolate they also plant a tree every time you buy a bar! See WeForest.org for more detail.

65% Dark chocolate with orange oil 100g

Ok, I dropped it again!  Presentation in terms of packaging is stunning but I do find the presentation of the actual bar to be a bit boring but that's me being picky. Organic dark chocolate with natural orange oil won Gold-1 Star in the Great Taste Award 2011. According to their website the orange extract is the result of cold pressing the ripe fruit peels which are from Sicily and are organic.


The bar has a good snap and the orange oil aroma is not at all overpowering. The rich chocolate melts quickly freeing up a slightly bitter orange flavour which is well balanced with sweet dark chocolate.  The cocoa does well to battle against the orange and a hint of tobacco comes through at the end.  It just goes to show that sourcing the right ingredients makes all the difference between a good and a bad bar of chocolate.  I'm not a great fan of orange chocolate but this was very pleasant and enjoyable. Happy to award 8/10 for this bar. Buy online at Chocolate and Love at £3.20 per bar.

Coffee Affair

It has been a very, very frustrating week so far, in terms of computers and blogging.  Nobody told me that moving a blog from Blogger to WordPress would be so difficult!  Why do they have to make it so complicated.  It's all very simple they explain. Give permission here there and everywhere and 'hey presto' your blog has been transferred. Ok, that's good but hang on where are the pictures?!  Oh, we forgot to mention that you have to have a PHD in nuclear physics before this can happen. Grrr! While I count to a million and one, my new WordPress site is looking very sorry for itself and it will probably remain that way for a while until I can summon up the strength required to start again.  If anybody knows of a simple way to transfer the whole blog and nothing but the blog then let me know.  I might even send you one of my very own chocolate bars!


Ok, we're talking chocolate and already the endorphins are kicking in, lifting my mood!  Thank goodness for chocolate! 


The Chocolate: "Coffee Affair" from Chocolate and Love is dark, organic and contains 100% Fairly Traded ingredients.  Don't confuse this with the Fairtrade organisation.  Packaging looks fantastic!

Naked Chocolate:  A well made bar of chocolate (apologies for the crack but somebody broke it..not me). The bar is bright and has a good snap which demonstrates that it has been well tempered.  The bar is made by a Swiss company for Chocolate and Love.  I've noticed this with several chocolate providers that they farm out their chocolate bar production to somebody else so they can concentrate on other parts of the business.  I did overhear at Chocolate Unwrapped that they were looking to start home tastings which would be a fun way to start a dinner party.  You might also be interested to know that Chocolate and Love are running a competition.  Not just any competition they're giving away a £10,000 diamond, click here for information.


This particular bar won a Silver Award at this year's Academy of Chocolate for 'Best Flavoured Dark Bar'. They were up against Amelia Rope and Paul A Young to name just two. 

The cocoa content of this bar is 55%, so not very high for a dark chocolate.  I can't pick up a big coffee aroma from the bar.  The bar is well balanced in terms of cocoa and coffee which makes a pleasant change.  Coffee is not a flavour I would always choose as I've tasted some horrendous offerings in the past.  This is all very mellow with a hint of espresso in the background.  No nasty bitter flavours coming through at all, which for me, is good.


Overall a good bar of chocolate with pleasant enough flavours and at £3.20 for a 100g not a bad choice. I liked the bar and presentation and I think it deserves 7/10. To buy this bar click here.


To win a massive diamond click here. 

Filthy Rich - 71% Dark and Organic

What a week!  The economies of Europe are in melt down.  Prime Minister Merkle has propped up the Greece economy so much that effectively Greece is now Germany's bitch.  They now have more support than Chesty Morgan, Google it and you'll see what I mean.  If Greece default on their loans then which bits are they going to cut off?  Don't bother racing down to the poolside to grab a sun lounger as it will be a pointless exercise - the Germans will already own them!  Meanwhile British workers swelter in the unseasonably high temperatures.  Some lucky few escape and head to Brighton, soon to be renamed Brightonabados, if these temperatures continue.  Somebody in government has suggested that increasing the speed limit to 80 mph will stimulate the economy and he's probably right.  Look at Germany, they have a good economy and they have autobahns.  I can't believe we never made that connection before.  A so called 'City Trader', interviewed on BBC1, dreams of the next double dip recession.  There are always those that are going to try to make a fast buck from a disaster and become Filthy Rich.

Ok, I know that is a rubbish link but this review can only get better.  Filthy Rich, what a fantastic name,  sounds like something Harry Enfield might have said. Created by Chocolate and Love an online chocolate boutique.  Founded by Richard O'Connor and Birgitte Hovmand entrepreneurs who travelled round the globe to bring us some of the very best chocolate back to the UK. 


The Chocolate:  This colourful, vibrant packaging has a bejewelled quality feel about it and conceals a bar which is described as containing premium quality cocoa from Fairtrade cooperatives in the Dominican Republic and Peru .   The aroma from this chocolate is making the hairs on my neck stand up.  If you're an early riser, like myself, you'll know that recently the mornings have been very cool and slightly damp which gives the air an intoxicating forest smell.  Well this is exactly what I'm getting from this bar which is deep and intense wood, tobacco and fruit, possibly blackberry, but that may just be my imagination running away with me.  Anyway it certainly hits the spot!

The sharpness of the fruit comes through slowly as the chunk of chocolate luxuriously melts on your tongue. The chocolate is smooth, rich and has a delicious liquid mouth feel.  In comparison to 'Crushed Diamonds', which I gave  a score of 9/10, this bar is in another league.  At £3.20 for a 100g bar this is good value for a really great bar of chocolate.  This bar receives 9.5 points and this is only because I never give 10 out 10 because the producers might stop trying!  I recommend you stock up today.  Click here to buy online.

If you're visiting London then you can find their bars in Harvey Nichols.  


Plus, for the chocoholics out there Chocolate Unwrapped will be taking place on 15 and 16 October at Vinopolis, London.

Chocolate and Love - Crushed Diamonds

Now that summer has almost completely lost its shine, thank goodness chocolate is once again back on the menu!  A visit to the Speciality Food Show at Olympia at the beginning of this week was well worth a visit.  It was great to see all the hundreds of small entrepreneurs eagerly promoting their wares.  Chocolate, of course, was a great attraction and a chance to see what was coming onto the market.  Unfortunately, I just missed Paul Young talking about his latest creations but a chance to chat with Richard from Chocolate and Love, the guys and girls at Zotter and Amelia from Amelia Rope to name just three made up for this.  Not enough time and too many stalls meant I couldn't get to each and every one.  I did however manage to grab a few business cards from companies I'd never heard of before.  So, be warned, I will be in touch!

Chocolate and Love: Of course I had heard of this company before having visited their stall at Chocolate Week a year or so ago but for some reason I didn't know much about them.  The business was created by Richard O'Connor and Birgitte Hovmand in early 2010.  Having travelled half the globe searching for chocolate the company literally popped onto the chocolate scene.  Buying a shop wasn't an option for these two.  So, using vacant shops to provide 'Pop Up' chocolate emporiums was a quirky and Wonkaesque way to raise their profile and a novel way to attract punters to their online business.  As more and more well known names disappear from the high street perhaps pop-up style shops are the future?  It certainly sounds more exciting than what we have now. 


Pop Up to Online means their ever growing range of products are available to everybody who owns a piece of IT gadge. Their website is a mix of online shopping, tasting advice, chocolate clubs and of course tastings which seem to be big business. At just under a £1,000 that's some serious tasting but I imagine its well worth it and everybody comes out feeling gooood! 

Crushed Diamonds: What a great name and if you become a fan of Chocolate and Love you will enjoy the names they've come up with as much as their chocolate.  "Filthy Rich", sounds good!
To quote, "Dark chocolate with cacao nibs using 100% organic and fairly traded ingredients. Top quality organic cocoa from small Fairtrade cooperatives in Peru and Dominican Republic. Premium quality cacao beans are roasted and broken into small cacao nibs, giving the bar a sensational crunchy texture".  This bar has a cocoa content of 55% which is light for a dark bar.  Nothing elaborate about the mould used just plain and simple. The bar has a lovely rich cocoa aroma as you inhale deeply.  Always smell the chocolate before you taste this accentuates the overall taste.  The slightly lower cocoa content provides it with some milk chocolate like qualities.  The smooth and slightly sweet chocolate melts quickly in the mouth to reveal the diamonds - aka cocoa nibs. I'm not usually a fan of cocoa nibs but these are just the right size and add texture.  This is a delicious bar of chocolate and I'm going to lock it away before I devour it in one sitting!


In terms of score this bar receives 9/10 not only for its great taste but because it is organic and uses fairly traded ingredients.  Not only that , Chocolate and Love has committed to supporting reforestation in Ethiopia in conjunction with WeForest.  Every time you buy a bar - we plant a tree! 
To buy this bar click here £3.20 for a 100g bar.

Psst have you heard about
this chocolate?

Posted by Richard.